Islamic State: British boy rescued from Syria, says foreign secretary

The UK has rescued a British child from Syria as part of efforts to return stranded unaccompanied minors amid the aftermath of the Islamic State conflict.

Chancellor Dominic Raab said repatriating the boy was “the right thing to do.”

He said that every case of orphans or unaccompanied children trapped in Syria was “carefully” evaluated.

Save the Children said that some 60 British children were in Syrian refugee camps, many of them under the age of five.

Many of the youngest children are born in Syria to British parents and have never lived in the UK.

The recent repatriation was first reported by Sky News, which said a team left the Middle Eastern country with the boy on Tuesday.

Raab said on Twitter: “I am pleased to have been able to bring home a British boy from Syria. As I said before, we carefully evaluate each case.

“Safely facilitating the return of orphans or unaccompanied British children, where possible, is the right thing to do.”

• Can orphans trapped in Syria go home to the UK?

Save the Children said many of the children fled Islamic State-controlled areas and have endured “extreme conditions” in the camps, adding that Covid-19 was now present in both camps where the charity works.

“It is difficult to contain the disease in a place where social distancing is not possible,” Sonia Khush of Save the Children told the BBC, calling it “a recipe for unfolding disaster.”

The repatriation process takes many months, Khush said, although the charity is not directly involved in the negotiations, it only helps prepare the child for resettlement to the UK.

He said they tried to focus on the “positive” elements of repatriation: the opportunity to live more comfortably, go to school, enjoy typical childhood experiences “like riding a bicycle, for example.”

“But children are afraid,” Ms. Khush said. “They have already been through a lot in their short lives.”

Children have often been repeatedly displaced as fighting intensifies across the country.

“They have many questions about what is going to happen to them, and it is quite difficult to take them away from what, for them, is home,” he explained.

“It is also difficult for the children left behind. They have been each other’s family.”